The jamming trio of Body Count, Gym Class Hero and Barry Yerdead pushed the team from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre out to an early 26-3 lead on their way to a 42-15 win.

Key Jam of the Game: I would say it was the 7^th jam when Diamond City's Barry Yerdead scored a 9-2 decision over Heywood JaBlowmee to convincingly put the game out of reach for his team.

This was the best bout of the night as Puget Sound pulled away late in the game to claim a 39-23 victory.

Key Jam of the Game: The 7^th and final run of the bout. Puget Sounds Cop A. Phil began the jam with the star on his bucket. But as he made his way though the pack, he handed the cap off to Quadzilla who promptly skated his way to a 10-0 score that salted the bout away.

The third jam of this bout saw Twin City's Rocky Whorer come away with an 8-5 run over Puget Sound's Ryrod that gave them a 14-11 lead. However, those would be the last points the team from Minnesota would score in this one as Puget Sound went on a 36-0 run to end the game at 47-14.

Key Jam of the Game: Josh Englund's 9-0 skate over Twin City's Bruce Knuckles in the 5^th jam really pulled Puget Sound away to a lead they would never look back from.

Dallas jammers Johnny "Pocket" Rocket and Rinkworn put on a dazzling display throughout this bout as they led their squad to a 55-17 victory.

Key Jam of the Game: It was probably one of the first three jams since the score was already 31-9 after the fourth jam (the one where I started keeping track again). I spent too much time hanging out talking to Meg MyDay and missed the start of the bout (lol)

This was a close bout early on, but Dallas eventually used their superior speed to pull away from Twin City. This was also critical in the overall outcome of the tournament since Dallas was so banged up with different injuries they suffered throughout the night (and they only had 8 skaters to begin with), they made the decision to pull out of the finals against Puget Sound.

Key Jam of the Game: Mat-O-Matic's 9-1 scoring run during the 5^th jam that pulled Dallas out to a 23-12 lead and an eventual 37-12 win.

Just like 3^rd place bouts at other tournaments, this one was basically my "break bout". I'm pretty sure Dallas won the bout, though. But I spent the entire 2^nd half upstairs hanging out with the Dockyard drinking beer and the such.

Diamond City held an early 4-2 lead after three jams. But after that, Puget Sound took off both offensively and defensively as they eventually cruised to an 83-41 triumph for the first ever men's championship.

Key Jam of the Game: Quadzilla's 13-4 scoring run in the 4^th jam of the first period gave Puget Sound a lead that they never looked back from.

3. Gym Class Hero. A very fast, agile skater for Diamond City, he is also a very smart skater from what I saw.

2. Quadzilla. Usually he dazzles us around the northwest during lulls in the action with his killer skate-dancing skills. But he showed that he can also be an excellent derby skater (which I believe he was back in the day). He's also quite the entertainer…..the male version of Goodie Two Skates.

1. Johnny "Pocket" Rocket. Most of the people I talked to seemed to agree with me that he was the best skater in the tournament. Granted, that wasn't with everyone in attendance. But he is certainly a dynamic skater who played a great tournament for Dallas.

There were two of them, really. One was when Puget Sound blocker Hunter S. Toss'em started to execute a leg whip for his jammer, Quadzilla in the championship bout. It didn't quite work out, though as a Diamond City blocker did a nice job of getting in the way to break it up.

There was also the time about midway through the first Twin City/Dallas bout when Hollywood Chuck Bury volunteered to fill-in for Dallas after they suffered yet another injury to their already depleted roster. Out of desperation to try to find a red shirt to match the Dallas skaters uniforms, Chuck turned to Alan and asked him if he could wear his red Break Neck Betties shirt. Alan said "sure" (or something like that) and they traded shirts right there on the spot. So there ya go, Rose City. You had some representation out there on the track for at least a couple of jams!

Hopefully this won't be something I have to mention in the blogs too often. But I will when something like this happens (lol).

It happened during the 5^th jam of the second bout between Puget Sound and Dallas. It's kind of hard to describe exactly, but after about a minute or so there was absolutely no pack out there at all. Oh, there may have been a couple of skaters rolling along side each other over there. But other than that, the skaters on the track were spread out all over the place. I thought the funniest thing was how all the refs were skating around shouting at the skaters to "pack it up"…something which by that time was a pointless request. In my notebook, I wrote "maybe the worst jam ever"? If you were there and saw that debacle, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

One thing I found interesting on the night was the rules for the tournament. Although I don't know what the exact rule-set was, from what I understand is that there wasn't any minor penalties to be called and only majors. For me, this is a concept that I wouldn't mind see getting some thought into for two reasons. The first being that I would like to see an overall streamlining of the rules so that when teams venture into other parts of the country to bout, I don't have to listen to the skaters complain to me about how shitty and confusing the local reffing was during the bout (which ALWAYS happens no matter who it is and where they go). And the second reason (and maybe the main reason) is that if a bout is going to be decided on a late penalty, I would much rather it be an obvious "major" penalty and not some lame ticky-tack 4^th "minor". At the end of the day, I want to see the skaters decide who wins the games and not the refs. Although the concept wasn't perfect on Saturday night, I thought it was an interesting experiment which hopefully will start leading to that streamlining myself and many others would like to see.

I also think that when it comes to the men, they need a slightly bigger track to play on. It's kind of like in car racing; on a ¼ mile oval track, cars with V-8's generally go faster than the open wheel midgets, Outlaws and smaller engine cars, but the action on the track isn't as exciting as what the smaller cars can provide since they don't have enough room to fully showcase the power and speed of their vehicles. If it's logistically possible, I would recommend adding about 10 feet to each straightaway and make the turns a little wider. But that's just me talking here J

Overall, I thought that the tournament on the track was a success! The bouts may not have been the closest in the world, but if you look back at the scores from the 2006 Dust Devil and the results from the 2007 National Tournament, you will see that for the most part the scores get closer and closer as time goes along. Although I don't think men's derby will ever be as big as women's derby, it was still an excellent start to something that I am sure will become more popular over time.

The only downer of the night for me was that someone walked away with my Michigan State Spartans hockey jersey while at City Lights (or whatever it's called now. But it's been City Lights for many years and I spent many hours in that place in the past. So it's still City Lights to me). Oh well…I only have about 50 more hockey jerseys in my closet to choose from.

It was an awesome night, though! And by 7:00am, the only "survivors" from the night were me, PsychopathChick and Pandora Panic. A marathon that went on for almost as long as that infamous night during Rollercon last summer. Good times, though! I can't wait for the next tourney I can hit up…male or female.